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Mechashades
The Mechashades are a mysterious organization that sells their services to the highest bidder. These services include all forms of industrial espionage and sabotage, and, as such, they are in great demand from unscrupulous merchant houses looking to gain an advantage over their competition. Of course, it is rare that there is any provable link to the ruling family of the given merchant house. Instead, a lower ranking member will invariably be used as intermediary so that, should the authorities investigate, the house can claim the member was acting on his own misguided volition— the merchant family would never endorse such despicable tactics and naturally will do whatever they can to assist with enquiries. While it is true that, on occasion, minor factions within a merchant house have contracted the Mechashades’ services without the knowledge of their superiors, it is more common that the house patriarch, matriarch, or ruling council (whichever holds the true power in that particular instance) has in fact sanctioned the decision, whether tacitly or overtly. While it is impossible to know which of the Lathe Worlds the Mechashades operate from, it is widely suspected by Calixian Arbites that they do function from that trio of forge worlds. Perhaps they have no true central location, and operate instead through a network on all three planets. While their services are often purchased by nobility, merchant houses, or the politically influential across the Calixis Sector, the Lathe Worlds note the highest propensity for unexplained acts of sabotage attributed to the group. This may be lax investigation on the part of the local Fortress-Precinct, however, the sheer volume of reports lends credence to the accusations. Once their services have been retained, the Mechashades will deploy operational teams led by rogue Tech-Adepts. Each adept’s seniority and expertise varies depending on the specific task at hand. At their command is an army of mech-wrights and servitors of every kind, equipped with digital tech or hefty machine tools as required. Most merchant houses start out by requesting some form of espionage perpetrated against their closest rivals. Often this is simply the acquisition of sensitive information that will provide some profitable advantage. Prior warning of takeover attempts and marital family mergers allows a house to prepare for trouble or issue counter proposals. Figures for service bids and trade costings enable the house to undercut and win new charters. Technical schematics and organizational charts mean the house can replicate its opponent’s successes, while the joyous news that a rival is in financial difficulties or even close to collapse allows the house to be ready to sweep in and claim the broken pieces when the time comes. However, once a merchant house has this valuable inside information, it is more than tempting to use the Mechashades’ expertise once again in order to make best use of the data. After all, why wait for a rival’s monetary collapse when you could precipitate it? Why merely copy a rival’s methods when you could damage or wreck his operations? Even if such things are not requested by their employers, the Mechashades will suggest further services that they could perform, illustrating the huge difference they can make in elevating the fortunes of one house over another. Indeed, if the employer seems reticent, they often embark on such operations unbidden, presenting their acts of sabotage as a fait accompli. No one would ever believe that the house had not sanctioned these deeds, and so they can do little about it even if they wanted to. So, like it or not, the Mechashades will soon be engaged in widespread activity on behalf of the merchant house. Their operations will grow in frequency and severity, designed to cripple competitors and propel the house into a huge campaign of expansion and acquisition. Mechashade operatives blend in easily in any industrial or commercial setting and the senior Tech-Adepts can easily overwrite the programming of servitors and machinery belonging to the target when necessary. As such, they can gain access to the most critical systems. Authorization codes are stolen or changed. Requisition requests for vital supplies and repairs are cancelled or switched. Alarm systems are triggered to cause huge delays or deactivated to cause serious danger. Soon, structural problems and accidents will be arranged. Industrial machinery seizes up after being anointed with the wrong grade of lubricant. Furnaces overheat and explode after pressure shut-off gauges are jammed. Hydrothermic dams suffer catastrophic breaches. Operations on orbital docking stations are brought to a standstill when docking clamps lose power. Mineshafts collapse, cranes tumble, fuel depots catch ablaze. In one case a fully laden cargo hauler’s anti-grav engines failed and the vessel crashed down directly onto a rival family’s estate mansion, killing two-thirds of the house leadership. It is only when matters are close to irreversible for the unfortunate competitors of the merchant house that has employed the Mechashades that the organization makes their boldest move yet. They initiate contact with those houses they have been systematically destroying and offer the chance to outbid their current employers. The Mechashades will happily play the rival houses against each other, fostering what amounts to a secret auction as each side ups their bids, desperate to gain or retain the Mechashades’ assistance. On occasions, merchant houses have refused to bid and instead sought the aid of the authorities---this is the main source of intelligence that has made the Adeptus Arbites aware of the Mechashades. However, so far this has been to no avail. The merchant dynasties in question have promptly fallen into ruin---the killing blows already poised to strike in case of this eventuality. The resulting investigations have proven fruitless; rogue servitors are practically impossible to distinguish from the thousands of others unless they are caught in the act of sabotage. Only deep analysis of their programming code can identify the traitors definitively, but such testing requires expert skills and it is nigh impossible to screen an entire workforce. As a result, most houses agree to bid and, whatever the result, the Mechashades gain a considerable boost to their fee. Should the outcome be that their loyalty switches, their former employers will be faced with serious problems. All the while the Mechashades were working for them, trusted as an ally, they were also quietly acquiring data from their employer’s systems, learning access codes, and reprogramming servitors and machinery with hidden sub-routines that would stay dormant until needed. As such, any organization that has ever paid for the services of the Mechashades will in turn be severely vulnerable to their attacks, should they subsequently change allegiance. What is particularly worrying for the Arbites, is that the Mechashades have worked on behalf of dozens, perhaps hundreds, of merchant houses over the decades. They must have built up a huge amount of information, and soon will have infiltrated the commercial and logistical operations of the sector so thoroughly that, should they so wish, they could cripple the entire infrastructure and bring Calixis to a grinding halt. Trade and industry would cease, billions would starve, and, more importantly, tithes would go unpaid. Whether such calamitous sabotage is indeed their ultimate agenda, no one knows. Some say the Mechashades are led by a Heretek Magos in league with the fel powers of Chaos and striving to weaken the sector prior to some future military incursion. Others theorize that they are making a play to destroy or control every major merchant house and themselves become the dominant commercial enterprise across the sector. Some even point to a connection with the Skaelen-Har Hegemony, suggesting that the huge corporation is their ultimate master. Either way, the Mechashades cause untold disruption to trade and industry in the Calixis Sector, whoever they happen to be working for, and the net result is that the sector’s output in terms of the Imperial tithe is reduced. It is not surprising then that both Sector Governor Hax and Lord Marshal Goreman, as well as more than one of the Great Houses, have devoted considerable resources to locating and purging the Mechashades. 'Catastrophic Designs' Agents of the Mechashades are currently targeting the merchant trade Houses Drogar and Pikkofule, situated within the heart of Hive Sibellus on Scintilla. The two allied houses previously employed the Mechashades themselves and enjoyed a tremendous boost in their fortunes as their competitors and rivals suffered critical problems, failures, and accidents. However, one of those rivals has recently succeeded in buying away the Mechashades’ loyalty, and now Drogar and Pikkofule are learning what it is like to be on the receiving end of a campaign of disruption and sabotage. Both are already facing serious difficulties, but now the Mechashades are preparing a monumental blow that will ring the death knell for the merchant houses and, quite possibly, many others besides. They have just acquired a seismic torpedo, an enormous piece of ordnance that was destined for use on one of the titanic warships of the Calixian battlefleet. Its warhead is capable of a massive level of destruction, designed to create artificial fault-lines in a planet’s crust, causing tremors and quakes that will level buildings for hundreds of miles. The Mechashades have a particularly diabolical plan in mind for the warhead. Deep within Hive Sibellus, roughly half a mile below the domains of House Drogar and Pikkofule, almost down to the shattered dereliction of the underhive, they are nearing completion of a huge industrial operation. The site is centered about one of the three gargantuan spine-pillars that support the entire structure of the hive. This enormous foundation tower is hundreds of meters in diameter, and constructed from millions of tonnes of steel and adamantium. The outer layer alone is ten meters thick and many more layers form concentric circles within, bonded together with mammoth iron-forged girders. Massive, ancient generators are hidden within its depths, maintaining enormous power fields to bolster structural integrity. The Mechashades have spent months drilling, grinding, and excavating a passageway into the core of the spine-pillar. In order to complete this monumental project they have re-tasked an army of industrial servitors and heavy equipment from the two houses above. Once they have reached the center, they will install the warhead and detonate. The result of the explosion will be nothing short of catastrophic. At the very least, the spine-pillar will suffer major damage, the factoria, refineries, and warrens of Drogar and Pikkofule will crash down upon themselves, collapsing into the underhive, and all the areas in line above will likely plummet down on top. Millions of workers will perish and the damage will be irreparable. At worst, if the spine-pillar is completely severed, and if the remaining structure cannot cope with the resulting hive quakes, then the entire mountainous edifice of the spire could collapse down onto the rest of the hive. Billions would die and Hive Sibellus would be essentially destroyed. The repercussions would cause irrevocable damage to the entire Calixis Sector.